Notifications and messaging with friends and family can often distract you from the time and keep you awake. Did you know that you can set a “Do Not Disturb” schedule so that you are no longer alerted to incoming notifications or calls although they are still received.
You can do this by going to:
Settings
Focus
Do Not Disturb
Set a Schedule
You can also personalise the ‘Focus’ to allow certain calls or notifications from key contacts.
There are also other forms of focus such as driving.
View the short clip below to see how to set up the schedule.
Each week we’ll be posting a useful DigiTip to help you make the best use of technology. To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!
This is a very quick tip, but hopefully a useful one! There may be occasions where you need to minimise all the open windows and apps on your laptop or desktop screen. Perhaps you are just about to start presenting and want to remove all open windows? Or you may just want to remove all clutter and get back to your desktop?
You can press the Windows key + D to minimise all open apps and windows and will take you back to the desktop. If you want to reopen all windows and apps, just press the same keystrokes again!
Blogpost by Jia Ping Lee (Digital Capabilities and Skills Development Coordinator)
I remember first stumbling across Code First Girls through their social media during the summer of 2023, and then I learnt of Aberystwyth University’s new partnership with them. Having had no prior experience of coding and not having much knowledge about the tech world, I was surprised at how easy it was to look through the courses that Code First Girls were offering and regardless of what level of coding you had – there would be an appropriate course for you.
Being a complete beginner with coding languages, I had a look through their introductory courses titled MOOCs (Code First Girls’ massive open online courses). These courses were designed to introduce and provide beginner level tech skills and help build up confidence in an area of your choice. What I thought was fantastic about these courses was how it was organised and rolled out. With MOOC Sprints, they were running over 4 weeks with 1 one-hour live session per week and after the Sprint ended, you had the opportunity to test your knowledge and experience real world problem solving with MOOC Challenges and receive a certificate of completion after passing the session quizzes. I experienced a variety of the introduction courses offered including coding, web development and solving problems with Python. As I was able to review what I learned at my own pace after classes, it wasn’t as overwhelming as I initially thought, and the course tutors were always available to contact if you needed extra help or guidance.
Having thoroughly enjoyed taking the first steps towards gaining some tech confidence, I am looking forward to developing the skills I’ve learnt from the introductory courses and progressing onto the next level. I think that the most important lesson I have taken away from this experience is to never be afraid of trying something new that is outside of your comfort zone. The coding world may initially seem scary and difficult to get into, especially if you hadn’t learned about it before. But with Code First Girls, they really are here to help guide and support us to achieve the best skillset we need for future exciting opportunities!
Take a look at this blogpost where you’ll find 5 reasons why you should take advantage of Aberystwyth University’s partnership with Code First Girls. To find out more information about all the opportunities available with Code First Girls, please visit their website.
As we near towards the start of the Semester 2 examinations, we’ve put together a range of resources to help you make the most of technology as you prepare and revise for your exams.
Please also take a look at the general FAQ’s for exams, and if you have any questions about any of the resources listed above, please contact the Digital Skills Team (digi@aber.ac.uk).
Do you often get swept up with the amount of clutter and unused apps that keep building up on your phone?
With DigiTip 30, we can have a look at how to create folders on your phone and categorise your apps by types to help keep you organised. Example folder categories could include travel, finance, lifestyle, entertainment, social media and many more!
Let’s have a look at the videos below for a brief demonstration:
N.B. The videos will include an example for IOS devices and an example for Android devices.
Blogpost by Shân Saunders (Digital Capabilities and Skills Development Coordinator)
As the end of the academic year approaches, you may be starting to think about job prospects and future careers and where to start with this journey. LinkedIn now offer “Rock your Profile” webinars to help you learn how to build an interesting profile that is appealing to your ideal audience as well highlighting key features and best practices for building an engaging profile. These webinars are available at different times of day, register now at: Rock Your Profile (linkedin.com).
Aberystwyth University Careers service also offer reviews and advice on improving CV’s and LinkedIn profiles. You can access these services through in person drop-ins at Level D Hugh Owen Library during term time, the Careers team are also available via email at: careers@aber.ac.uk. Alternatively, the Careers team also conduct sessions on successfully building a CV and a LinkedIn profile, these sessions are advertised on the career’s portal: www.aber.ac.uk/ABERcareers. We also had a session about how to use LinkedIn at our Digital Skills Festival which you can access here: How to use LinkedIn – Digital Skills Festival 2023 (6 – 10 November) (aber.ac.uk). You can view further resources on LinkedIn through the videos below:
Whether you’re working on one screen or two, you will most likely have multiple windows open and as such you have probably found yourself frantically trying to find the window you’re looking for.
DigiTip 29 has the solution!
You can view and swap between all your open windows by using Windows key + Tab.
View the short clip below to see the shortcut in action.
Each week we’ll be posting a useful DigiTip to help you make the best use of technology. To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!
Back in October 2023, we wrote about an exciting new partnership between LinkedIn Learning and CoderPad, which brought forth the addition of Code Challenges to LinkedIn Learning. These challenges are tailored to assist learners, from beginners to advanced, in developing their coding skills through interactive exercises and real-time feedback. You can revisit our previous blogpost on this collaboration here.
AI and Generative AI are swiftly becoming the cornerstones of innovation. To support your development in these skills, LinkedIn Learning has expanded its collection to include 73 courses with hands-on practice for AI and Generative AI skills. You can find all of these courses on this webpage or explore a selection of them below.
All students and staff have access to all courses on LinkedIn Learning, including those with hands-on practice, through your free Aberystwyth University LinkedIn Learning account. If you have any queries about LinkedIn Learning or accessing any of the content mentioned in this blogpost, please contact the Digital Skills Team (digi@aber.ac.uk), or come along with your questions to one of our weekly drop-in sessions!
As someone who uses Microsoft Teams every day for work, I’ve discovered a collection of useful keyboard shortcuts and tips that have helped me in navigating the platform more efficiently. Whether you’re a staff member jumping from one meeting to the next, or a student using MS Teams to collaborate on projects or attend virtual lectures, these tips should help you to make the most of MS Teams.
Keyboard Shortcut
Description
Ctrl+Shift+O
Turn off your camera
Ctrl+Shift+M
Mute your microphone
Ctrl+K
Create shorter hyperlinks
Shift+Enter
Start a new line in the chatbox without sending the message
Summary of the key keyboard shortcuts mentioned in this blogpost
Turn off your camera quickly
There are times when you need to quickly turn off your video during a call, it may be that your bandwidth is limited or there are distractions behind you. Quickly toggle your camera on and off by using the Ctrl+Shift+O shortcut.
Customise your hyperlinks
Instead of cluttering your messages with lengthy URLs, make use of the Ctrl+K shortcut. This shortcut allows you to customise the displayed text for your hyperlink, making your messages more concise!
Mute your microphone
Background noise can also disrupt meetings (I have two dogs that bark whenever someone rings the doorbell, so this is my most-used shortcut!) Use Ctrl+Shift+M to mute and unmute your microphone swiftly.
Refine your search results
Teams has an useful search functionality, but sometimes it can yield too many results! Make the most of the available filters to refine your search and to save you time.
Start a new line in the chatbox without sending your message
Typing messages in Teams can be tricky, especially when you want to add line breaks without sending the incomplete message. Use Shift+Enter to start a new line in the chatbox without sending the message prematurely.
Make quick decisions with the polling feature
Do you need to gather opinions or make decisions quickly? If you’re looking to create a poll once you’ve started your meeting, Teams offers a built-in polling feature.
Please note: We suggest that you use Vevox, AU’s polling tool, if you’re looking to set up a poll in advance of your online meeting or session.
Mark messages as urgent or important
Do you want to send an important message on Teams and are worried that it will get lost within a stream of messages? To solve this issue, you can mark any messages as urgent or important in MS Teams.
Do you have any other shortcuts or other general tips when you’re using MS Teams? If so, we’d love to hear from you! Share your tips and shortcuts in the box below ⬇
Are you planning to work on a collaborative group project with your peers or do you want a co-worker to provide you with comments without permanently editing the document?
Today, we will look at how to add comments to collaborative documents that multiple people can edit. By utilising the comment function, others can understand your ideas behind any changes, ask any questions and offer alternatives without affecting the main document.
With the comment function, there are various features you can make the most of – replying to comments, reacting to comments, and resolving them through tracked changes.
Let’s have a look at the video below for a brief demonstration:
N.B. This video was recorded in Microsoft SharePoint. However, the process with SharePoint and OneDrive are very similar to each other.
